Premier Doug Ford has announced that the province will officially begin stage one of its three-phase reopening plan later this week, despite reservations being expressed by Ontario’s top public health official about whether we are ready.

Ford made the comment during his daily briefing at Queen’s Park, noting that an announcement with more details will be made Thursday.

It comes on the heels of the province permitting hardware stores and garden centre to fully reopen over the weekend. Retail stores were allowed to reopen for curbside pickup only on Monday.

“On Thursday we will share more good news,” Ford said. “More good news about getting people to work, more good news about opening more places and getting paychecks out the door and more good news about slowly getting back to normal.”

The province’s own framework calls for a “consistent” two-to-four week decline in new cases before phase one can begin.

Speaking with reporters during his daily briefing at Queen’s Park on Tuesday, Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. David Williams said that we are now at “day seven or day eight of a downward trend” but aren’t yet at a point where he would be confident to recommend the reopening of the economy.

“I would have recommended it if we were already there but we haven’t (got there) yet. We’re in a downward trend; we’re in about day seven or day eight of a downward trend. Unfortunately not a very rapid downward trend but is trending that way and our other metrics are looking good. But we haven’t had all those things come together yet where you would say that now we are ready to enter stage one,” he said. “I think we are getting closer in that but if were already there I would have already recommended it.”

Ford has consistently deferred to the advice of public health officials in guiding his response to the COVID-19 pandemic but on Tuesday he said that we will “hit stage one on Thursday,” a statement that is hard to reconcile with Williams comments.

A spokesperson for Ford, however, did later clarify that phase one won’t begin on Thursday and that Ford will just be detailing what it “will look like when we get to that point.”

“I have confidence in businesses. They are already getting ready to open up and they are very responsible. The vast majority if businesses are doing everything they can to protect their staff and customers,” Ford said earlier in the day.

No specific target

While the province has not set a specific target for the decline in new cases needed before it can begin to reopen the economy, Williams has spoken of a need for it to be “well below 200” in the community each day to allow for proper contact tracing.

On Tuesday, there were 361 new cases confirmed, up from 309 one day prior. .

“When we got above about 120 or 130 new cases a day we soon got overwhelmed with that and started to see those community spread cases,” Williams said on Tuesday afternoon. “The point will be to get back to that level again where we can contain it because then if you have second waves you can quickly jump on and contain that.”

The province has previously said that the first phase of its reopening plan will begin with the opening of some outdoor spaces as well "select workplaces" that can "immediately meet or modify operations" to adhere to public health directives.

The first phase would also allow for a “greater number of individuals to attend some events, such as funerals.”

Speaking with reporters, Ford said that while the province still has a “long ways to go: in its battle with COVID-19, there are now “many reasons to be hopeful,” including a recent decline in the number of new cases of the virus.

He said that the province now has 80 labour guidelines that businesses will need to follow as they reopen and that “now is the time to prepare.”

The province’s framework for reopening, which was released last month, calls for a two-to-four week period between each phase.

The second stage will look at reopening some service industries as well as additional office and retail workplaces. It would also involve some larger public gatherings.

The province, however, has warned that “sporting events and concerts will continue to be restricted for the foreseeable future.”